Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
chairman R K Pachauri has dismissed as “unfounded and baseless”
allegations that findings of the Nobel prize-winning UN body on
disappearing ice from the world's mountain peaks were based on a
doctoral student's essay.
“The claims that ice melting from the world's
mountain peaks was based on a student's essay are totally unfounded
and baseless and I maintain that the IPCC monitoring systems are
robust and solid,” said Pachauri, who has lately been in the line of
fire for “faults” in the IPCC report.
A question mark has appeared on the credibility
of the IPCC for quoting a report that Himalayan glaciers will melt by
2035 from a science magazine without peer-reviewing it. “Yes, there
was only this error which we accepted and corrected as well when it
was brought to our notice. I still maintain that the IPCC monitoring
systems are still robust and solid," Pachauri had later said,
admitting and regretting the fault However on allegations over
scientific errors regarding Amazon forests and disappearing of ice in
world's mountain peaks, he says that “the IPCC is correct on its claim
on both issues.”
British newspapers questioned the IPCC's
decision to cite a WWF report to support its claim that 40 per cent of
the Amazon forests could disappear due to declining rainfall and even
be replaced by tropical savannah. The newspaper also accused the IPCC
of citing a magazine article by Mark Bowen and, another, a
dissertation written by a professional mountain guide and climate
change campaigner Dario-Andri Schworer.However, scientific faults in
the IPCC report are not the only allegations that Pachauri is
currently facing. Questions have also been raised about his lifestyle,
“million dollar suits” and preference for fuel-guzzling SUVs.
Allegations are also there that he was enjoying profits as the IPCC
chairman as well in holding the post of director general of The Energy
and Resources Institute (TERI).
Pachauri has termed all these allegations a
"pack of lies". He recently told a media conference that “every single
payment that I receive goes to TERI. The extra money that my
organisation generates goes into the 'Lighting a Billion Lights'
campaign that TERI has launched. These allegations are nothing but a
pack of lies”.
Meanwhile, the Sunita Narian-led Centre for
Science and Environment has reacted to the IPCC’s Himalayan blunder.
Associate director of the CSE Chandra Bhushan
said: “It is important to recognise that it was a silly mistake on the
part of the authors of the IPCC report (those who wrote and reviewed
Chapter 10 of the Working Group II: Impacts, adaptation and
vulnerabilities) to pick up a non-peer reviewed paper and quote it as
a definitive finding. Silly still, they quoted a definitive year -
2035 - for the vanishing of the entire Himalayan glaciers.”
“Considering that the science of climate change
is still evolving (that is why the IPCC publishes its reports every
six years), giving a definitive year was a blunder. Having said that,
it is important to recognise that this faux-pas of the IPCC doesn’t in
any way take away the fact that Himalayan glaciers are indeed
receding,” he added.
